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they are probably missing 4 nailed on starters (brown, sinckler, wallace and saili). still looks a pretty good quins side. they look, even without wallace, very strong at the breakdown and plenty of ball carriers.

considering those who picked up knocks last week good to see all but Tom Curry in the squad. i do wonder if we should have rotated beaumont for ostrikov for a bit more bulk in the tight five. back row battle should be good.

tough away game, quins always easier to play in the international periods. if we are targeting 3-4 away wins a season this is on the 'maybe' target list.

stevenethey are probably missing 4 nailed on starters (brown, sinckler, wallace and saili). still looks a pretty good quins side. they look, even without wallace, very strong at the breakdown and plenty of ball carriers.
considering those who picked up knocks last week good to see all but Tom Curry in the squad. i do wonder if we should have rotated beaumont for ostrikov for a bit more bulk in the tight five. back row battle should be good.

tough away game, quins always easier to play in the international periods. if we are targeting 3-4 away wins a season this is on the 'maybe' target list.

Rotation aside (and that's a pretty big aside nowadays) Catrakilis would be an absolute nailed on starter. Buchanan too probably as he was first choice hooker all of last season. Twomey had also moved ahead of his other young rivals (Matthews and Merrick) to partner Horwill.

But unless it is an absolutely critical match few clubs name their absolute first choice team - and most clubs probably wouldn't know what it is anyway!

MartWhitSmith has masses of talent, but he isnt the finished article. Quite a bit of objectivity has been lost in the current excitement about him, as it was for Cipriani/Slade/Ford/Farrell/Burns before him.

I tend to agree, I think he's done really well in the games I've seen but o think some of the praise and MOM awards have been slightly over the top.

I think you're getting carried away. He's deservedly had praise from the likes of Kingston and Eddie but they've also made it clear that he has a long way to go. In fact I haven't seen much hyperbole about him at all. He's playing well in a mis-firing team and there's nothing wrong with pointing that out just because he's 18.

He's a really nice bloke for an Aussie. I went to the QoS recording when he was on and they did the video comparison between him scoring v wales and Usain Bolt winning a 100m race. Great show that. Bryony Page was on as well and Tuffers hadn't remembered her in a previous show.

Absolutely. Quins didn't pay all that money for him to sit on the bench. Smith has been thrown in at the deep end and has done well but I'm sure he will be used more sparingly when Catrakilis is fit. Remember he's only a kid.

Newcastle have shown us the way to play away. Make sure you stay in the game. Don't blow it in the first 30 mins trying to play miracle rugby and making dumb mistakes. Keep it simple and give yourselves a chance

Message to Mr Forshaw, must practice line out maul defence, and sweeper system defence next week.
Oh and a bit more work from the Guru on how to have the right mind set for the first 20 minutes of an away match !

Watching on a live stream which has frozen just at the end....why was the penalty reversed?

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There were some individual positives - thought Strauss had a decent game, Jono Ross has an endless gas tank, he was grafting until the end, JOC looked a class above when he came on, and Ioane was an absolute whirlwind of energy and explosiveness - but on the whole that was very concerning.

We were our own worst enemy in this game. So many knock on's, passes gone to no one and people going on their own and getting turned over. Games like these with teams similar to us should be won. Faf as good as he is needs to stop doing meaningless kicks

Oh well, Charnley will get a run out next week while Byron goes to naughty step.

Aulika good when he came on seemed to do what i was screaming at my screen for tarus to do, which was just to go for the turnover before the ruck formed, as he quite often was in position to do it all game.
A lot of our better players played poorly today and they'll be kicking themselves they couldn't have done better tonight.

Guru Kelly jokes aside we really do have a psychological issue with away games. 7 wins out of the last 36 away in the league (3 of those were against the team that was eventually relegated) and 1 in the last 14 and regularly shipping 40+ points. That really is unacceptable on any level

For 20 mins in that 2nd half we switched on, played like a professional rugby team and did well. For the other 60 mins we were just a shambles. Dumb, brainless rugby, inexcusable mistakes, dreadful defensive set up, no line speed in defence, no bite or spark in attack. We don't learn from mistakes and we don't make good decisions under pressure or even not under pressure.

As happy and positive as I was last week I'm equally dismayed and unhappy this week. Forget top 6, its lower table mediocrity for this side even with the quality additions unless something radically changes in out approach and attitude to away games

And just one other thing, what was O'Conner doing on the bench. If he's fit then play him from the start and take him off after 50 or 60 if necessary. No pint bringing him n when the game is gone

I'm really annoyed and frustrated. I so desperately want Sale to do well, or even just not be crap, but we just @#$%& it up ourselves so often

We had a nightmare first 25 minutes and if you play like that then you'll always be in trouble. Credit in some regards to our lads to get the 1 bonus point and the players off the bench had some impact, T.J. particularly, he's done that a few times off the bench with high-energy. Almost a super-sub.

Not sure though why Dimes insists on giving the starting XV five minutes or so in the 2nd-half before making changes, those changes were apparent by halftime. If you adopt that tactic it makes it easier for the opposition as Quins starting XV have had 5 minutes to get into the tempo game.

Looks like we took lesson's from Gloucester by gifting a number of interceptions but we got one back from Sam James.

Danny Care easily won the battle of the 9's and deserved the man of the match. Faf had a bad night and drove me mad with his insistence on box kicking. I know it's good but tonight it wasn't and in the latter stages when there was a glimmer of a 2nd-point he kicked it away cheaply when by that stage it was obvious to keep the ball in hand. Add to that why did he keep drifting to the wing in defense, he did it a few times.

Ross didn't do himself any favours with the ref, quote 'if I've told you once, I've told you 10 times.......' if you keep on at the ref you'll annoy him so much he'll not give you marginal decisions.

Credit to Quins who were desperate to not make it 3 losses in a row, they have a better intensity and that's our downfall, the better teams a just a bit better than us at that and those small margins make the difference. Marler is a great player, such a handful and the the young lad Marcus Smith is one of the best new English talents I've seen for a while. He's going to be an England player soon and given the depth England have that's some credit to him.

All in all a frustrating night, it's ridiculous that we're such a different side away from home. We really need to address this otherwise we won't move forward much.

Why is our away form so bad? If the players can play so well at home, they should at least be able to compete away from AJB. Is this the players not doing what Dimes tells them to do, or is Dimes getting it wrong?

We do seem to have some sort of hang up playing away from home. It's easy from my arm chair but we should perhaps try to starve the home team of possession and territory in the early stages. It would also allow us to settle and find our feet before half time.

I'm glad I gave up away games some years ago after feeling the team hadn't turned up.

I don't like to criticise players but I get frustrated with commentators quotes like "Ioane has added so many options since he came on". I'm sorry, but IMHO he offers only one option which everyone knows. He is surely the easiest player to set a defence plan for. However, he does make Strauss look more like a donkey row in terms of pace.

It would be great to have some line breaking forwards for our undoubtably talented backs to feed off. We have been lightweight for too long.

Credit to them for coming back so well in the second half.

V pleased that Sam James seems OK. He is such a high class and versatile player.

Making sure you stay in the game in the early stages...what a ridiculous idea!! Far better to either aimlessly kick the ball away or try to play champagne rugby and attempt miracle plays in your own 22, cough the ball up and give away easy points

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